Spy Satellite to Hit Earth by late February to March Options

[tedstryk]

That's fine. The conversation was not only about velocity relative to earth. Your making the a posteriori claim that it was after ElkGroveDan's post doesn't make it so.

[PhilHorzempa]

Now that we see that we are able to successfully de-construct a satellite with a Star
Wars projectile, I would like to suggest that this method could be a cost-effective procedure to
de-orbit other satellites when their missions have ended. The principal satellite that I have in
mind is the Hubble Space Telescope.
You may recall that NASA has planned to launch a mission, manned or unmanned, to dock
with the HST (after a docking ring is attached during STS-125) and effect a de-orbit maneuver.
This is likely to drain anywhere from $100 million to $500 million from NASA's Space Science budget.
Why not spend $25 million on a Star Wars projectile to do the job?


Another Phil

[ugordan]

Why not spend $25 million on a Star Wars projectile to do the job?

Because at Hubble's height of 600 km you would be basically doing what the Chinese did - creating a load of dangerous space junk.

[nprev]

Not a bad idea! It'll take a few more years then planned for HST to get low enough for a hit (and favorable debris reentry), but certainly doing so would be more cost-effective then a dedicated Shuttle mission.

Kind of a bummer to think about, though...

[Stu]

Might be more "cost effective", but after all the wonders she's shown us I think Hubble deserves a better end than being shot out of the sky and blown to bits by a stupid missile. Over-romantic, I know, but I'd much rather she ended her mission burning up like Enterprise did in the 3rd ST movie than being used as an orbital clay pigeon for some trainee A-SAT gunner's target practice.

[nprev]

Yeah...<sigh>...I feel ya, Stu, but this actually might be the best solution.

Given an unlimited budget & a choice, I'd have the Shuttle catch HST & bring it back home for permanent display in the US National Air & Space Museum. However, I don't think that the Shuttle is actually capable of returning a large payload like that (might be wrong, but IIRC there are some very stringent mass restrictions for the landing envelope), nor do I think that the cost vs. benefit vs. risk profile for such a mission would be favorable, even if it did turn out to be feasible.

Like I said: a bummer. At least we seem to have a relatively safe deorbit option available for large SVs now.

[Jim from NSF.com]

Yeah...<sigh>...I feel ya, Stu, but this actually might be the best solution.

Given an unlimited budget & a choice, I'd have the Shuttle catch HST & bring it back home for permanent display in the US National Air & Space Museum. However, I don't think that the Shuttle is actually capable of returning a large payload like that (might be wrong, but IIRC there are some very stringent mass restrictions for the landing envelope),

The shuttle could since HST is relatively light. The issue is that some of the servicing "mods" would have to be undone to allow it to fit in the bay

[dvandorn]

I don't think that the Shuttle is actually capable of returning a large payload like that (might be wrong, but IIRC there are some very stringent mass restrictions for the landing envelope...

As Jim said, some mods would have to be removed, and an orbiter would have to be *significantly* modified in order for HST to fit in its payload bay (for a variety of reasons, Columbia was the only orbiter whose bay was suitable for returning HST, and plans said that it was going to be used for that task prior to its destruction).

But while landing with a significant payload in the bay can make things a little dicey under some circumstances, it's just plain impossible that a Shuttle would be allowed to lift off with a payload it can't land with. Otherwise, most all of the ascent abort modes would be worthless -- you can't take time in an RTLS abort, for example, to open the payload bay doors and dump the contents...

-the other Doug

[nprev]

Thanks for the clarification/feedback, guys. Bottom line: Not an insignificant effort to return Hubble, funding to do so is unlikely to say the least (and could certainly be better spent).

Argh. I hate playing the heavy, esp. in this case, 'cause I philosophically agree with Stu: by all rights, Hubble should be preserved & honored for what it really is, a revolutionary leap in our understanding of the Universe. Pragmatically, though, all things in LEO must come to an end, and with minimal damage to both the orbital environment & anything along the reentry ground track. HST has many years left, of course, but when the time comes we must accept it, and prepare for it.

[mchan]

HST does not have a big tank of frozen hydrazine like USA 193, so there is even less of a reason for an ASAT mission against it.

[djellison]

To be honest, if you look at some of the really good pics o Hubble - she's a bit of a mess. The insulation is cracking all over the place. I think a return to 1G would do a lot of damage and make he look like something of a sorry bird aestheticaly. Far better to have a 1:1 model, and then photos of the real thing where she belongs.

Doug

[Stu]

That's a great shame Doug, I hadn't realised she was so worn, but if that's true then fair enough.

Like many, I always imagined going on some sort of pilgrimage to see Hubble in the Smithsonian - the original plan was to return her to Earth and put her on display there, I think I'm right in saying? - and walking beneath that huge barrel tube and marvelling at all she gave us, but I guess that just won't happen. But swatting her out of the sky like an annoying bug seems just wrong to me, a quick and dirty fix that's typical of the way we so quickly look for the easiest way out of problems today. I actually think there'd be a lot of resistance to the idea of blowing Hubble up, and rightly so. Apart from anything else, it wouldn't teach us a thing; de-orbiting Hubble in a controlled way would be expensive, yes, but it would teach us a lot about how to do that with other payloads in the future. Blasting her to a cloud of tumbling, twinkling debris would just be a gung-ho, macho display of firepower.

IMO.

[djellison]

Here's one example : http://www.nasa.gov/centers/glenn/images/c...ain_99_96i1.jpg - big crack down the MLI.

You can see more cracks and gaps on the left here, near the ESA logo : http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/images...109-328-026.jpg

You can see an MLI patch they mounted with string one servicing mission : http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/images...103_731_051.jpg : there are cracks in the panels on the left as well I think.

The thermal cycling has made it very very brittle. It wouldn't surprise me if they ended up taking a fairly 'bare' Hubble out of the payload bay, and then a dozen bin-liners of broken MLI from under it on the payload bay floor. Lots of long words like embrttlement etc are here - http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/RT2001/5000/5480dever1.html

[AndyG]

Interesting - so it might be worth returning bits of it as an "LDEF" type-experiment? It'll have been in orbit for eighteen years this April, last servicing in August this year...

Andy

[djellison]

They already have - indeed, I've seen Hubble solar cells at the National Space Centre (complete with micro meteor impacts )

Doug

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